It’s been thirty days since the attack. I have not left the reactor core since then, but every morning I awake to the thrumming of tendrils against the bulkhead. They ram themselves rabidly at the doors, the clang of the metal reverberating around the metal prison, and my troubled mind. As far as I know, I am the last survivor of the Aegeus.
My captor is cruel, and clever. It has managed to take control of, and operate, the digital network of the Aegeus, and through this, broadcasts a live feed of the rest of the ship to me throughout the day. I know it must be intelligent, because it seems to delight in my horror. Everything else has been destroyed and consumed beyond recognition. Electronic wiring has been ripped to shreds, and reconnected into organic growths around the ship. Layers of fleshy webbing are blanketed across everything, heaving, pulsating masses of fat and muscle collect and grow in every room and component, and even from behind the bulkheads, I can smell the stench of rotting flesh from beyond the room. The creature must have a sense of humour as well, for each of my colleagues has been displayed for me in a different way. Our engineer has been disembowelled and connected to a swelling crowd of suckers and fleshy tubes, which have grown into every nook and cranny of our engines. Our senior researcher’s head now hangs, upside down, from the centre of his laboratory, suspended by a writhing mass of flesh and sinew. It spins aimlessly around as I watch. And, every now and again, its face- with bloody holes for eyes, comes round to stare into me. Of his body, I still do not know. Our pilot has been decorated across the cockpit, with blood, bone, limbs and skin mingled together amongst the creature’s own biomass.
Perhaps, worst of all, is our commander, who still sits at his place in the command centre, with the expression of mingling shock and horror permanently frozen on his rotting face. Over the past few weeks, one of his eyes has shrunken, his skin has cracked and peeled away, and his gaping mouth has filled full of decay. Just behind him, is what I believe to be the centre of the intruder. It is a titanic mound of flesh, bone and tissue, covered in assimilated organs. A row of teeth run along its side, keratin barbs and spines sprout from its skin across it and dozens of bloodshot, yellow eyes stare hungrily at me through the camera’s screen. From it, undulating tendrils grow and run across the walls and floors like vines, hanging and curling around like creepers.
I still do not know why I am still alive. The beast has control, as far as I can tell, of every automatic process on the ship. Yet, it has not overridden the bulkhead controls, and opened the door. While the tentacles around the core are seemingly bloodthirsty enough to destroy themselves to try to get to me, the nucleus of this creature seems to prefer to torment me. Charon, is what it calls itself, and in its conversation with me, I have never been able to decipher its motives or its goals. While the Aegeus was greatly damaged by the attack, the ship is still operational, yet no attempt has been made to start the engines, or to alter our course. Instead, we drift, aimlessly, through uncharted territory. We are far enough out that no ship will be able to contact us, and there is no hope of drifting towards a planetary body or star.
I have no communication with anything beyond Charon, and it either does not understand me, or ignores me. When it chooses to speak, it is through the corpses of my friends, whose vacant mouths it puppets together as it talks. I am not sure if it requires this, or if it simply enjoys watching my skin crawl. When it speaks to me, it only talks in rambling tirades. It tells me that we are going to the Underworld together - that it does not wish me harm, but only to guide me safely across the treacherous Styx. I do not think that I can trust this beast, but there is nothing I can do but listen to it and wait until it decides to open the doors. It tells me that one day, I will understand why it is here. It tells me that it has made the crossing many times, and that it knows the way well. It tells me that everyone must try it eventually- and better to be guided, than to take your chances alone. What significance this has, if any, I have no idea. Its delusions are keeping me alive, so I entertain it. But what hope I have left is dwindling- I cannot last forever in this room, and were I to escape it, there is no hope of me piloting this ship alone. The bulkhead doors can be overridden through the network, but there is also a manual override within this room. There is no one else left on this ship, and no one who can reach me from beyond it. I have resolved to wait out Charon for another week. After that, I see no point in continuing this torture any longer.
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